A blood product must be strictly temperature-regulated at the stages from purification to blood infusion and its temperature must be regulated and kept in a manner to be divided into a first temperature zone suitable for storage of red blood cells (2-6° C.), a second temperature zone suitable for storage of blood platelets (20-24° C.), and a third temperature zone suitable for storage of frozen plasmas (−20° C. or less).
Therefore, under the condition that the blood product is stored at a fixed temperature, the internal temperature distribution is kept within the above blood product storage temperature range.
In the purifying process for the blood product, the blood product is kept within the storage temperature range using a special refrigerator, but for transportation from a blood center to a hospital, a portable transport box which meets the demand for prolonged accurate temperature regulation without an external power source is not available at present.
For this reason, the use of blood products in a remote place such as an isolated island is limited. Since a ship is used for access to an isolated island, temperature regulation must be performed for several hours without a power source and thus a compact, lightweight and energy-efficient transport box is needed.
Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2008-86608 (Patent Literature 1, PTL 1) proposes a blood product carrier which uses both a stirling refrigerator and a sheath heater so that the extremely cold air generated in the stirling refrigerator is heated by the sheath heater and it is internally circulated by convection for cold storage of the blood product.
Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2008-286506 (Patent Literature 2, PTL 2) proposes a storage container which includes an insulating container for storing a housed object at a specified temperature, a temperature sensor for detecting the internal temperature of the insulating container, a plurality of thermo-modules having a Peltier element, a heat absorption side thermal conductor and a heat radiation side thermal conductor, and a control board for driving the thermo-modules according to the result of detection by the temperature sensor and controlling the internal temperature of the insulating container, in which the control board controls the power supplied to the thermos-modules within a prescribed value range.